A New Spring
by Mochi-hime
Summary: An anthology of drabbles on the life of Sasuke Uchiha and Sakura Haruno. Time flies, but they weren't ready for the changes that came along with it.
1. Courage

_**Disclaimer:** __I do not own Naruto... unfortunately. _

_**A/N:** One of my first anthologies here. Sakura's just a young Academy ninja here, so I wrote her as a bit self-conscious and shy... I thought of her as depending on Ino a lot, because Ino was always the extroverted one._

_Reviews would be most appreciated. Enjoy!_

* * *

**_Courage_**

Ino had always told her to be brave. She had told her countless times never to back down if she wanted to do something, to speak out to protect herself. Even with these words echoing in her head, Sakura couldn't bring herself to have a little courage. She couldn't help but feel hurt at the malicious words often thrown at her, couldn't help but feel warm tears slipping down her cheeks whenever she saw a sneer thrown towards her cowering form. On this particular day, a group of girls she still didn't know the names of had been especially mean to her, throwing grass, sticks, and leaves at Sakura's tiny, huddled frame while laughing at the way her watery green eyes threatened to overflow with tears. Ino was sick and bedridden, and did not appear at the Academy like she usually did. Without her best friend, Sakura felt utterly alone and… helpless. Weak.

_'Hey! Forehead-Girl! Is it true that your forehead covers more than half of your face?'_

_'Loner.'_

_'She thinks she's so cool just because she's friends with Ino.'_

_'Freak.'_

Her pink little head shuddered as the words of the other students buried their way into her mind, no matter how hard she tried to forget about them._ 'Ignore them. Be brave, like Ino said. Like Ino said…'_

Sakura sighed, dragging her feet along the grass as she moved away from the huddle of Academy students, who were giggling and enjoying their lunch. Ears perked at every little whisper, every suppressed laugh thrown her way, and her already self-consciously hunched form withered and shrunk until she just wanted to dissolve into nothing. Her tiny feet broke into a clumsy sprint as a single tear slid down her rosy cheek.

_'Wannabe.'_

_'Stuck-up.'_

"Ino…" She whispered under her breath, tears she had held back for so long streaming down her face._ 'I can't do it… I'll never be brave…'_

Sitting down on a hillside, Sakura covered her face with her hands as her body racked with sobs._ 'What is… courage?'_

After she was worn out and completely dried of tears, she lifted puffy eyes to her surroundings, clutching her bento box like it was the only thing holding her steady in the world. She realized that the hill she was sitting on overlooked a magnificent lake, one that she had walked past many times when coming home from the Academy. There was a little dock jutting out into the water just below her, where a lone figure caught her eye.

Sakura squinted, sniffling a bit, as she tried to make out who this person was. It was definitely a boy, close to her age. He had black spiky hair and seemed to be glaring across the surface of the lake. She guessed he was an Academy student, and was proven right when she spotted a discarded bento to his side. Her eyes slid to his back, where a red and white symbol stood out boldly against his black, high-collared shirt. A fan…_ 'An Uchiha?'_

The young girl had heard about the prestigious Uchiha clan, but did not know much about it. All she knew was that something horrifying had happened to the shinobi of that clan recently, and that all of its members were murdered except for two. She had overheard her parents talking about the incident. They had strictly forbidden Sakura to go anywhere near the Uchiha Compound, and she, out of fear, didn't dare to step foot in that part of the village. Who was this boy who so proudly wore the dead clan's symbol upon his back? As she knew it, the only remaining Uchiha in Konoha was…

"Uchiha Sasuke…" She murmured in awe as she watched the boy silently. She had heard lots of girls talking about this "last Uchiha" and his infamous smirk, but she had never gotten the chance to see him, to actually study him somewhat. His eyes were trained on the lake, a deep scowl on his face. Even though he was as young as her, his face looked weathered and more mature, with eyes shaded in darkness. She couldn't tear her eyes away. Sakura was thoroughly mystified by this mysterious boy; his intense gaze, the dark shadows around him, his powerful atmosphere…

The Uchiha's head suddenly whipped around, his gaze locking with her stare. His eyes narrowed, and for a few agonizing seconds, onyx met jade in a deathly glare. Sakura, too surprised to look away and too frightened to keep staring, gave a little shriek and scrambled away, settling behind a nearby tree. Her heart thumped wildly in her chest. _'He saw me…'_

Cheeks reddening considerably, she cautiously peered around the tree, eyes wide with fear and excitement. The boy had his back to her once again, and it seemed like those last few seconds between them had never occurred. Sakura should have been scared of this boy, she should have wanted to avoid him at all costs. According to her shy nature, that was how she was supposed to feel. But through that brief locking of their eyes, she felt a kind of bond with him. A _connection._

She was enticed to stare at those incredibly expressive midnight depths of his eyes, was compelled to know more about him. Was this what bravery felt like? This feeling of recklessness, of desire for danger, was this courage? This Uchiha Sasuke was dangerous, she knew, but she wanted to know more. She wanted to get closer.

Sakura had always believed in love at first sight. She had dreamed of that very day when she would meet eyes with a stranger, and they would fall so passionately in love with each other that he would sweep her off her feet into a delightful happily ever after. Even though it was not exactly love, Haruno Sakura was sure she definitely liked Uchiha Sasuke. She did not get to experience love at first sight after all. Rather ironically, she was infatuated at first glare.


	2. Memories

He didn't know what made him stop. He just did.

The members of Team Taka stared at him, coming to an abrupt halt at his side. It was so very unlike Sasuke to stop suddenly while on the way to a destination.

"What's wrong, Sasuke? Enemies nearby?" Suigetsu took a sip out of his ever-present water bottle, scowling a little at the thought of having to fight _again_. He would surely be thoroughly drained by the end of their journey.

"I don't sense any other chakra around here…" Pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose, Karin frowned and looked around warily. "Why did we stop, Sasuke?"

The addressed man sighed and closed his eyes briefly. A hazy image of yellow and orange, pink and red, gray and green drifted behind his closed eyelids as he shut them tighter to block them out. He was going through one of his 'phases' again. This happened often, but it was temporary and he always managed to beat the memories with the right amount of effort. He couldn't let this, _them_, weaken him. This time, his memories were triggered by a particular cherry blossom tree he and his team were standing beneath at the very moment.

_Why now?_ Sasuke grit his teeth as more almost-forgotten memories flooded his mind. _Damn you, Naruto, Sakura, Kakashi. Why…?_

"We will rest here." Sasuke ordered curtly, sucking in a small breath. "I will signal when we are to continue moving. For now, you have the freedom to wander and replenish your chakra." He narrowed his eyes and turned away, signing that Team Taka was to disperse. Suigetsu and Juugo looked at each other confusedly, the latter finally motioning for them to leave their leader alone. Karin stubbornly stuck out her bottom lip and hurried to the Uchiha's side as the two males flashed out of sight.

"Sasuke… Do you need me to heal anything? If not… I can keep you company if you'd like…" Karin batted her eyelashes, red eyes hypnotic as she slowly removed her glasses.

"No. Leave me alone, Karin." Sasuke glared at her, silently telling her to leave with her other teammates. The redhead pouted and jumped away, grumbling a few words to herself.

Sasuke, finally alone, leaned against the trunk of the tree as he rubbed his temples, exhaling slowly. He sank to the ground, sitting comfortably on the blanket of flower petals that covered the ground. He stretched out a palm, catching a soft pink petal in his calloused hand.

_'Sakura…'_

He gradually succumbed to the flood of memories that were threatening to overtake him.

…

_"Sasuke-kun!" Sasuke opened his eyes to see the young kunoichi laughing as she towed an indignant Naruto behind her, her short pink hair flying in the wind._

'Like sakura petals,'_ He thought vaguely as he gazed at the numerous cherry blossom trees across the lake._

_"Sasuke-kun." Sakura repeated, stopping in front of him, smiling that stupidly innocent smile of hers. She held out a stick of sakura dango. "Come to the hanami festival with us! Everyone's there already!" The girl's cheeks were flushed with excitement and her green eyes sparkled with mirth._

_Sasuke took one look at his teammate, this brightness, in front of him and stubbornly turned his head away, letting out a small 'hn' of distaste._

_"See, Sakura-chan? I told you he would refuse to come, ttebayo!" Naruto frowned and crossed his arms, sticking out a bottom lip._

_Sakura's face fell, but she still looked at him with those jade orbs filled to the brim with hope._

_"Please, Sasuke-kun? Just for today… We can go as a team!" Sakura's hand holding the dango rose a bit._

_Sasuke glanced at her, the tips of his ears turning a bit red. She was looking at him with a pleading gaze that, for some reason, pierced his stony heart. He remembered a distant past when he had looked at his older brother with that same look, that look that seemed to say, 'just this once!'. He remembered Itachi just smiling at him, poking him in the forehead, and telling him 'maybe another time'. He remembered the hurt and betrayal he felt to know that in his brother's eyes, there was something more important than family._

'No one deserves to feel like that.'

_He gave a small huff and plucked the dango out of Sakura's grasp, making her beam with happiness. Naruto watched him do so with a look of disbelief on his face that Sasuke couldn't help but smirk at._

_"W-what?! Sasuke, you—"_

_"Hn. Shut up, Dobe."_

_Sakura giggled at her teammates' bickering. With an expression of utter joy, the pink-haired girl took each boy's hand and tugged them in the direction of the festival, smile growing wider with each second._

_"Look who was right, Naruto! Sasuke-kun agreed!"_


	3. Rain

He was sitting in the rain. Again.

Doing so always provided time for him to reflect, to let his thoughts linger on the past and the memories he never realized he had kept. Empty eyes turned to the dark heavens as wet bangs hung limply over his face. He was the last Uchiha. The last fragment of his broken clan. What use was there to a weakling like him, who couldn't save his family, who couldn't save his loved ones? What use was there to an avenger who couldn't even gain revenge? His hands ghosted over the wet stone of the bench beneath him, and his gaze turned to the path he had taken many years ago. The path that he had taken to escape his past, his home, his team—the effort all gone to waste. Because here he was again, in the same spot he had been in when he was a genin. Konoha.

Sasuke had promised himself that he was going to crush his former village. That he was never going to return to being a Konoha shinobi again. His expression grew cold, a subtle sneer settling on his lips. More goals he had failed to achieve.

He smirked. The exit to Konoha was right in front of him. He could escape without even trying. Even though his teammates were supposed to be monitoring him closely, they had left him alone to offer him some freedom and privacy, both of which he rarely got these days. _'Those fools…'_ Sasuke narrowed his eyes, his gaze still locked on his blatant chance of escape. He could be gone in the blink of an eye…

But then again, he couldn't. He didn't know why, but something deep inside of him told him to stay. Itachi had wanted it…

_Itachi._ Memories Sasuke could never suppress flooded his mind with sadness. Itachi had loved him so much… Had been the only one left who was willing to love him. And to think that Sasuke had wanted nothing more in the world than his death… Sasuke supposed he had gotten what he had desired for so long. Yet a part of him was still empty. He presumed it never would be full.

The shinobi shuddered under the soft pattering of the rain, biting his lip almost painfully. _Itachi died to protect you… To give you a chance of happiness…_ It was when the raindrops on his face became indistinguishable from his tears that he suddenly no longer felt the soothing coldness of the rain against his cheeks.

He opened his eyes, unaware that he had closed them, to see bright red cloud his vision where the gray sky should have been.

"You're going to catch a cold, Sasuke-kun."

He sighed and sent a weak scowl to his right. To the pink-haired kunoichi who was, at the moment, holding a ridiculously red umbrella over his head. He silently cursed himself for not noticing her chakra approach earlier. Why did she do this? Why did she have to be so…

"Hn. Annoying." He grumbled, closing his eyes once more. He felt her take a seat next to him, still holding the umbrella high.

The two sat in silence for a while, listening to the rain striking the ground and making musical plops on the umbrella over their heads. Sakura stole a glance at him, wondering if he remembered that night, her words, their genin days.

She had frequently seen Sasuke sitting alone, always on this bench, always when it was raining. She had wanted, more than anything, to sit by his side and provide him company. But she had known it was too early. Too risky. Today, Sakura had decided not to hold back anymore. He was hurting, and she wanted so much to heal him.

Her hand inched toward his hesitantly. She was overwhelmed with the fear of getting rejected, like she had been in the past, but the aching of her heart was so strong and the desire to give him a bit of comfort, a bit of _love_, was consuming her very essence. In a resolute decision to pull him up from the deep hole he was stuck in, she reached his cold hand and entwined her fingers in his.

Sasuke instantly flinched and glared at her, but she glared back with those fiery emerald eyes, holding his hand tighter as he made an attempt to escape from her grasp.

_'I'm not letting you go, Sasuke-kun. Not now, not ever.'_

As Sasuke stared into those intense viridian depths, he found himself relaxing into her touch. There was something in her eyes, a kind of spark, that puzzled him completely. Her expression vaguely reminded him of an expression he had not seen in a made him want to ask just what this girl felt for him, just what she wanted from him. But as he looked at her again, he no longer saw the kunoichi with green fire smoldering in her eyes before him. He saw Itachi, poking his forehead with a slender index finger. He saw his mother, smiling at him and ruffling his already messy hair.

_'I will always love you.'_

Sasuke's fingers tightened around Sakura's slender ones. Perhaps she could be his anchor in this world. Perhaps he could hold tight to her soft little hands and they would never weaken their grip. Perhaps.


	4. Insectophobia

Uchiha Sasuke was sharpening his weapons. It was all peace and quiet, except for the satisfying clinks the metal made against the whetstone, when a piercing shriek rang through the house.

He cut himself on a kunai.

"SASUKE-KUN!"

Sasuke walked(he never ran except in dire circumstances) hurriedly to the kitchen, the origin of the ear-splitting shouts. Though his face was emotionless and composed, his mind was in a whirlpool of questions. _'What happened? Bandits? Enemy nin? A robber?' _His grip tightened around the kunai in his hand as he rounded the corner into the kitchen.

"Sakura. What's wrong?"

His pink-haired teammate had come over to his apartment to keep him company and to "cook you a decent lunch", in her words. She had seen him only eating tomatoes when he actually ate, and occasionally going out for ramen with Naruto. He was going to ruin his health, she had said. He had said that he would rather ruin his health than eat her horrible cooking, which had earned him a painful punch in the head.

At the moment, the monstrously strong Sakura Haruno was backed up against the wall, a shaking frying pan in her hands and a horrified expression on her face.

_'A frying pan.'_ Sasuke lifted an eyebrow. _'Seriously?'_

As he thought about it, though, he had never heard Sakura scream these days. She had grown up, had become famous as Konoha's best medic with the fearsome strength and fiery temper. She had taken a sword through her stomach without screaming, for kami's sake. What was wrong with her now?

His eyes followed Sakura's line of vision, resting on the cause of her hysterics.

A _cockroach_. On the floor.

"WHAT IN THE WORLD IS THAT THING. IT'S HUGE." Sakura's eyes widened and her chest heaved with each word. She shakingly waved the frying pan at it experimentally, and shrieked once again when it did not budge.

"Calm down. It's only a cockroach." Sasuke rolled his eyes. Sakura was freaking out at _this_ tiny thing?

"SHUT UP AND KILL IT. NOW."

Sakura scooted behind him, clinging to his arm and muttering some colorful words as she stared at the bug.

The Uchiha rose his eyebrows. Sakura had not clung to him like this since their genin days. Heck, she had not even touched him except to heal ever since he had come back to Konoha after the war.

"Hn." He stretched out a leg towards the creature, calmly nudging it with a sandaled foot. He shouldn't have done that. The bug scuttled towards the wall.

All hell broke lose.

"SASUKE-KUN IT'S MOVING DAMMIT OH MY GOD." Sakura lost it. She started swinging the frying pan in various directions, catching Sasuke in the jaw.

"SAKURA—"

"SHANNARO."

Sasuke heard a boom and the next second, they both were surrounded with dust. He immediately knew what had happened.

A gaping hole stared at them from the middle of the wall, and debris littered the floor around them. For a long moment or two that seemed like forever, a uncomfortable silence issued between the two.

Unusually, Sasuke was the one to break it.

"You're scared of bugs." He sighed and rubbed his aching jaw. "There was no reason to overreact like that." He stared at Sakura's wide green eyes, frowning a bit.

"Ah… I'm… I'm sorry. I don't know what happened to me." Sakura let go of Sasuke's arm, feeling a bit embarrassed for clutching at it so tightly and panicking so much. She looked at her dust-covered fist. "I'll pay for the damage."

"No." Sasuke looked at her pointedly and huffed. "I doubt you'll even have the money to."

The kunoichi smiled softly. He sometimes knew more about her than she thought he did. "Thanks, Sasuke-kun." She rested a hand on his arm, peering at his scowling face.

"Hn."

As he silently turned away to get back to sharpening his weapons, he spotted a black spot moving across the kitchen tiles near his feet.

"FUCK. IT'S BACK."


	5. Remembering

"Hn. Idiots."

Sasuke rolled his eyes at the results of his teammates' carelessness. Of course Naruto would manage to break more than half of his dishes. Of course Sakura would manage to drop her bowl of soup on his living room carpet.

The Uchiha sighed and rubbed his floor with a rag once more, grumbling when the stain of tomato soup refused to go away. How did he, the shinobi prodigy of his generation, get stuck in this situation? It all had started with a innocent, and clean, team dinner. At his house, of all places.

Naruto had teased Sakura a bit ("You begged me to bring Sasuke back!" "Oh, that time? Sakura-chan's face was redder than a tomato! By the way, don't you like tomatoes, teme?") and things escalated quickly after that.

So it all resulted in their team dinner ending early and Sakura apologizing countless times before finally leaving.

As Sasuke gave his carpet a final scrub, he caught his eye on a small, red object underneath the couch. Frowning, he picked it up and looked at it closely._ A book?_

The cover was plain and it seemed to be a notebook of some sort. Sasuke raised an eyebrow and turned to the first page of the book, when familiar, sweeping handwriting came into his line of vision—

_The Diary of Haruno Sakura._ Sasuke scoffed in disapproval. Only _Sakura_ would do such a worthless, time-consuming thing like keeping a diary. And he thought she had finally grown up. He gave a small "tch" of annoyance and turned to the next page. As much as he hated to admit it, he was… _curious_. What did that kunoichi write about in her diary, anyways?

"Probably stupid things," he muttered to himself, scanning her first diary entry.

_'So Ino gave me this diary for my birthday. I know I shouldn't have accepted it from her, since we're rivals and all that, but she ran away before I could hand it back to her. Not before sticking her tongue out at me, though._

_That pig._

_Well, anyways, so here I am. Tomorrow, I'm planning to give chocolates to Sasuke-kun to ask him on a date… Maybe. I hope he likes sweets. And maybe he just might remember my birthday this time!'_

A smirk settled on his lips. He was right. _Stupid_. He guessed this was during their Academy days. He didn't remember much from then. Turning to the next entry, he was a little surprised at how brief it was.

_'Sasuke-kun hates sweets. And he doesn't do birthdays.'_

And this is how Uchiha Sasuke came to spend the next two hours reading all of Sakura's journal entries, from the most embarassing to the most ridiculous. He couldn't believe Sakura had kept this journal for so long. He couldn't see the reason behind it. She had recorded their genin years in more than half of the tiny book:

_'I'M IN SASUKE-KUN'S TEAM, SHANNARO! But then I also got stuck with that baka, Naruto…'_

_'We went on a mission to capture someone's cat, for kami's sake…'_

_'There's something going on between Sasuke-kun and Naruto. I don't know what it is, but I'm worried…'_

Sakura had always been so worried about them. Sometimes she worried too much, and it unnerved Sasuke to see someone who actually cared so much for him. Who valued his life over her own.

"Hn." Sasuke huffed to himself as he turned to the second-to-last page of the diary. The first things he noticed were the strange crinkles and stains in the paper, like someone had cried over the page.

_'He left. I did everything I could, but…'_

His eyes widened slightly. So this was the night he had left Konoha. He could remember her frantic confession to him with those tears running down her face, he could remember being swayed—just for a moment—that he could be satisfied with his team in Konoha, he could remember knocking her out and placing her ever so gently on that bench…

_'Everything I said to him last night was true. It will never be the same.'_

The entry ended there, with more tear stains and ink smudges. And that was the end. No more entries. The last page was a blank one. Sasuke sat back and closed his eyes. An overwhelming feeling of guilt, of some kind of regret, clenched his heart. He was the cause of her happiness, and the cause of her pain. He had made her wait so long. _He had been the idiot._

So he creased his brow, grabbed a stray pen, and began to write.

.

.

.

Sakura heard a sharp knock on her door just as she brought her steaming cup of tea to her lips. Frowning, she walked on light feet to see who in the world was visiting her so late at night. After that disaster of a team dinner at Sasuke's apartment, she was not sure that she wanted to face even more trouble.

She opened the door hesistantly, a forced smile ready on her lips.

"Why so late—"

She froze. There was no one there. Then who had knocked?

Her sharp eyes scanned her surroundings for a trace of her mysterious visitor. They caught on something red lying on her doorstep. _'My diary…?_

She narrowed her eyes in confusion. She was sure she had kept that thing safely in her purse at all times…

_'Huh… It must have fallen out…'_

Picking it up gently, Sakura rifled through the book experimentally, her hand freezing when she reached the last page. Her green eyes grew wide with both shock and understanding and a small smile crept its way up her features.

For where there was a blank page before, an all-too-familiar scrawl graced its space.

_'Thank you.'_


	6. Wedding

"WHAT?!"

Sakura eyed her blonde teammate, sighing as she noted the obvious surprise on his features.

"I said, I'm getting married."

"B-but Sakura-chan…!" Naruto instinctively grabbed her by the shoulders and looked into her clear emerald eyes. "Are you sure about this? Wh-who…?"

"Sasuke-kun, you baka." The kunoichi hit Naruto on the head for good measure. "Who else would it be?"

Naruto gaped at the stoic Uchiha a few feet behind her, then at the glittering band around her finger, then back to her face again.

"You can't marry that bastard! You guys haven't even started dating yet!"

Sakura groaned and buried her face in her hands. "Naruto. We've been dating for the last two years."

A look of utter shock, then realization slowly crept its way across Naruto's face. So _that_ was why he always managed to be left alone with Kakashi on team outings. _That_ was why Sakura had a happy flush on her cheeks whenever she was with Sasuke, and why he had been so gentle with her in the last few years…

"EH?! You never told me, ttebayo!" Naruto pulled at his unruly hair, making a pained expression on his face. "I thought we were friends! I thought we didn't keep secrets from each other anymore!"

"Hn. We don't have to tell you everything, dobe," Sasuke huffed, crossing his arms and sending a annoyed look at his ridiculous teammate.

"And I know Sasuke-kun's not the type to make obvious affectionate gestures, but shouldn't you have figured it out by now…?" Sakura ran a hand through her hair, exasperated. "Well, anyways, we want you to be the best man at the wedding this spring." Her cheeks turned pink as she pronounced the word, as if she couldn't even believe it herself. "Uh, so… See you!"

Naruto stared at the retreating backs of his teammates incredulously. Really? _Married? _How could they do this to him? He paused, his face reddening considerably by the passing second.

"TEME! You better treat her right, or I'll kill you!"


End file.
